Friday, March 30, 2012

DEATH SQUADS: Mawdudi, Khomeini, & Lessons for Karachi.

2003: When will the Americans start begging the world to let them off the hook in Iraq? It seems that the Americans are not going to start begging any time soon. What seems imminent is massive casualties in Baghdad as the Americans try to quicken its fall. We want our army generals to win all kinds of wars for us. In normal times, however, we rail against them for killing democracy in Pakistan instead of killing our enemies. We complain about the growing burden of the defence budget and beef about too many army officers holding civilian posts. But when there is war, we pluck the generals out of their obscurity and want them to give us solace. They do an honest job, giving us hope that we will not lose the war, but they do it at the cost of reality. They also do it at the cost of professionalism and all the lessons they were made to imbibe as officers. Ex-army chief General Aslam beg said in “Nawa-e-Waqt” (3 April 2003) that an invading army normally should have five-to-one superiority but the Americans didn’t have it in Iraq. But if the Americans wanted to yield some corpses they would attack Baghdad. Such an act would be disastrous for the Americans and would bog them down. After that, they would beg the world to extricate them from the quagmire but no one would be able to help them. Aslam Beg has always been strong on predictions which usually don’t come to pass. He predicted an American defeat at the hands of Saddam Hussein in 1991 and was proved wrong. Since he was then chief of the army in Pakistan his “defiance”, while much admired by the Urdu press, destabilised Pakistan’s political system. He believed that Americans would not fight on land after the defeat in Vietnam, but now the Americans seem willing to fight on land and even take body bags. The progress of war in Iraq is quite rapid despite some miscalculations by Rumsfeld and his cohorts in Washington. When is an army bogged down? One month? Two months? Two years? When will the Americans start begging the world to let them off the hook in Iraq? It seems that the Americans are not going to start begging any time soon. In fact Baghdad has fallen more quickly than most had anticipated. Talking to “Khabrain” (3 April 2003), General (Retd) Zahid Ali Akbar said that if America bombed Pakistan then Pakistan should threaten the United States with a nuclear strike on their naval fleet nearest to Pakistan. He said if too many body bags reached America the public there would reject Bush and elect a Democrat president who may firmly take the US back to the United Nations. He said if he was in Saddam’s shoes he would have made chemical weapons. He said if he was General Musharraf he would prepare a missile with a 2000-mile range so as to reach Israel. Zahid Ali Akbar got out of hand as happens usually with generals when they face the public and try to hand them a virtual victory through the use of loose language. A Pakistani threat of a nuclear strike against America is highly unrealistic. America is thousands of miles away and we don’t have an ICBM. Targeting an American fleet passing near Pakistan is comic because that would be a moving target and could simply float out of range upon being threatened. The same would apply to the base at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean if we have a missile that can go that far. The target would be too small. As for our missiles, Zahid Ali Akbar should know that they are not as “smart” yet as we would like them to be. The good thing about the Indian cities is that if you miss by a few miles you still hit human targets, but in the sea even the best missiles may miss. It is shocking that Zahid Ali Akbar wants to hit Israel without looking into the consequences of such an aggression on an empty stomach. In talking loose he may have pleased the public but he has put paid to the India-specific national nuclear strategy frequently announced by Islamabad. Famous war expert Captain (Retd) Saeed Tiwana wrote in daily “Pakistan” (3 April 2003) that American troops in Iraq desert would get roasted in the heat of the coming summer. He said the American war-planners were at each other’s throat and that President Bush was taking strong pain-killers like his father, Saddam’s earlier victim. He said America would get “phainti” (great beating) in Iraq and President Bush would stand trial for war crimes. Tiwana is unleashed every time there is war. He is a poor man’s Ollie North. It is good to hear that son Bush is taking pain-killers like father Bush, but Tiwana should tell us what pill we should take to dispel the disrepute into which he brings the Pakistan army every time he opens his mouth. We are all with Tiwana but he should know that we can produce better fantasy on the Iraq war than he can. REFERENCE: Second opinion: Threatening America with a nuclear strike? Khaled Ahmed’s Urdu Press Review Friday, April 11, 2003 http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_11-4-2003_pg3_6

US Democrat Charlie Wilson with Colonel Imam

ISLAMABAD: Hafiz Mohammad Saeed, the chief of Jamaat ud Dawa (JuD) a charity organisation accused by West and India for exporting terror from Pakistan, has confessed for the first time about his meeting with al Qaida founding father Osama Bin Laden and said that he studied from the same scholar who taught bin Laden and Ayman al-Zawahiri. “Yes once I had met Osama Bin Laden but that is an old story I met him probably in 1982 in Saudi Arabia and in that meeting we just waived at each other,” said Saeed in an interview with Dawn.com. Saeed’s organisation was banned by the United Nations Security Council days after the Mumbai attacks in November 2008 for its alleged involvement in the attacks and extremists activities. However local courts have allowed the organisation to work in Pakistan. Saeed, the most wanted man by India, is a holder of double master’s degree in Islamic Studies and also is a former teacher at Engineering University, Punjab. He said he was a proud student of Sheikh Bin Baz. Bin Baz was the grand mufti (scholar) of Saudi Arabia from 1993 to until his death in May 1999. AfPak head and a retired CIA officer, Bruce Riedel in his book titled “The Search for Al Qaeda” has described Bin Baz as one who “preached a very reactionary brand of Islam, proclaiming earth is flat, banning high heels for women as too sexually provocative, barring men from wearing Western suits and imposing other restrictions on behavior.” When asked is it not a coincidence that he studied under the same cleric who taught Osama Bin Laden and Aiman al al-Zawahiri? Saeed said it was the honour for both the students and the teacher. When asked about the reports regarding the financial help by Osama Bin Laden for establishing Lashkar-i-Taiba back in 1989-90, Saeed denied by calling it “baseless allegation.” Asked how it was possible that he could not have met Bin Laden in neighboring Afghanistan while he was waging Jihad next door in Indian administered Kashmir, Saeed brushed aside the question saying, “put this matter aside.” Saeed declared the killing of Osama Bin Laden as extra judicial act and in the same breath he said that it was yet to be verified if the al Qaeda chief was in the Abbotabad compound or not. He said that US was the biggest terrorist who did not prove anything against bin Laden in any court of law. When asked if his men or he himself were helping the jihad in Afghanistan, Saeed said that the Afghanis were doing well themselves and they did not need anybody’s help. “We are doing what we can do for them,” he added. Saeed who used to hide from cameras has started appearing on television screen these days, when asked about the reason behind this change of mind he said that he has taken this decision to counter the propaganda against himself and his organisation. REFERENCE: Osama, Zawahri and I had same teacher: Hafiz Saeed By Azaz Syed http://www.dawn.com/2012/02/07/bin-laden-zawahri-and-i-had-same-teacher-hafiz-saeed.html

Late. Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd Allah ibn Baaz [Saudi Grand Mufti who issued Fatwa against Saddam and then against Osama Bin Ladin] Let me be blunt and allow me to say that since the first day of arrival of First Oil Rich Pedophile/Pederast Arab Rascal Sheikh in Pakistan our Rulers from General Ayub to Zardari [Bhutto is included] played the Role of Pimps and Paddlers for them e.g. Wild Hunting Parties [with every kind of vice] in the most poor areas of Pakistan i.e. South Punjab – The Seraiki Belt – or you may say the HQ of Punjabi Taliban. They way these Rascals Treat Working Class [Educated Middle Class] from Pakistan, India and Bangladesh could only be called worst kind of slavery and cruelty because from Airport to Work Place these Arabs [from Executive to Citizen] insult them and violate every Law given in the book particularly the Labour Laws. And these very Arabs are Financing the Khawarijs in Pakistan, let me show all of you their real face:

Khadim ul Harmain Sharifain - Shah Fahad The Debauch - In reality, it was a test of the ebullient Fahd’s capacity to govern. The Crown Prince would have to live down his personal reputation as a reckless womanizer, drinker, and gambler. REFERENCE: King Fahd’s Saudi Arabia by Harvey Sicherman August 12, 2005 http://www.fpri.org/enotes/20050812.middleeast.sicherman.fahdsaudiarabia.html

Real Face of King Fahd: There were stories of all night sessions at seedy clubs in Beirut, of affairs with belly dancers, and of the wife of a Lebanese businessman paid $100,000 a year to make herself available. Then in 1969, Fahd was said to have lost $1,000,000 in a single dusk-to-dawn marathon of Scotch-fuelled gambling at the tables of a MonteCarlo nightclub. He was summoned back to Riyadh by his brother, the then King Faisal Abdul Aziz ibn Saud. REFERENCE: Life and legacy of King Fahd By Paul Wood BBC defence correspondent Last Updated: Monday, 1 August 2005, 10:14 GMT 11:14 UK http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/4734505.stm

Saudi Arabia’s King Fahd: [The Mutawwa in Chief due to his fingering Streets of Pakistan are burning] Real Face: His visits with his retinue of 3,000 had earned the local tradesmen riches indeed. It is estimated that an extra €30,000 (£21,000) a day was spent just in Puerto Banus. As heir apparent, Fahd first visited Marbella in 1974 and stayed at the Incosol hotel and spa. He booked 100 rooms but some of the princesses didn’t like the decor so he ordered the dark carpets to be changed to white. As a reward, Fahd left the hotel a tip of $300,000 — enough for the entire staff to receive, in effect, an extra year’s salary. He told one Spanish journalist that he liked Marbella because “it was a land blessed by Allah”, referring to the Arab occupation of most of Spain from the 8th to the 13th century. In the early 1980s he started the construction of his Mar Mar Palace, a replica of the White House. Because of increasing ill health (he suffered a stroke 10 years ago), he last visited in August 2002, just after a £134m refurbishment of the palace. REFERENCE: Marbella mourns its own King Midas King Fahd’s epic spending enriched his favourite part of Spain, says Deirdre Fernand From The Sunday Times August 7, 2005 http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/article552402.ece

Vice-President George H. W. Bush returns from his trip to the Middle East, where he has passed along a message to Iraq to step up its air war against Iran (see July 23, 1986). The covert machinations nearly become public knowledge when US embassy officials in Saudi Arabia, learning of the Saudi transfer of US arms to Iraq earlier in the year (see February 1986), question the Saudi ambassador to the US, Prince Bandar. Bandar, fully aware of the arms transfer, tells the officials that the transfer was “accidental” and the amount of arms transferred was negligible. The State Department is also curious about the transfer, warns that the arms transfer violates the Arms Export Control Act, and says it must inform Congress of the transfer. Such a notification would endanger the entire process, and possibly short-circuit another arms deal in the works, a $3.5 billion transfer of five AWACS planes to Saudi Arabia, of which Congress has already been informed. But after the White House notifies the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Richard Lugar (R-IN), and mollifies Lugar by telling him the arms sales to Iraq were “inadvertent,” “unauthorized,” and involved only a “small quantity of unsophisticated weapons,” Lugar agrees to keep silent about the matter. Another senator later approaches Lugar about rumors that Saudi Arabia is sending US arms to Iraq, and recalls that “Dick Lugar told me there was nothing to it, and so I took his word.” [NEW YORKER, 11/2/1992] REFERENCE: August 5, 1986: Covert Arms Sales to Iraq Nearly Revealed http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=us_iraq_80s_134#us_iraq_80s_134 Profile: Bandar bin Sultan a.k.a. "Bandar Bush", Prince Bandar http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=bandar_bin_sultan

Shaking Hands: Iraqi President Saddam Hussein greets Donald Rumsfeld, then special envoy of President Ronald Reagan, in Baghdad on December 20, 1983. REFERENCE: US NATIONAL SECURITY ARCHIVE Shaking Hands with Saddam Hussein: The U.S. Tilts toward Iraq, 1980-1984 National Security Archive Electronic Briefing Book No. 82 Edited by Joyce Battle February 25, 2003 http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB82/

What a joke that Aal-e--Saud and Saudi Muttawwa Abd-al-Aziz ibn Abd-Allah ibn Baaz issued a Fatwa of Takfeer [Apostasy] against Saddam Hussein [that too after he was no more of any use to Corrupt Aal-e-Saud and Wahhaabi Muttawwas whereas an Anarchist Pakistan Ahl-e-Hadith Scholar Late. Ehsan Elahi Zaheer [who was on the payroll of Aal-e-Saud and Saudi Muttawwas rather he was student of Salafi Islamic scholars such as Muhammad Nasiruddin al-Albani and Abd-al-Aziz ibn Abd-Allah ibn Baaz] had addressed Sddam Hussein and his Ba'ath Party Member [as per Saudi Fatwa "Apostate, Secular, Socialist i.e. KAAFIR] REFERENCE: Ehsan Elahi Zaheer http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ehsan_Elahi_Zaheerصدام حسين مع إحسان إلهي ظهير رحمه الله - فيديو نادر

Really sometime "This Muslim Ummah" is so hypcortie that one wants to puke.

Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney, accompanied by senior aide Paul Wolfowitz and US CENTCOM commander-in-chief General Norman Schwarzkopf, visits Saudi Arabia just four days after Iraq invades Kuwait (see August 2, 1990). [SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, 8/3/2000; DUBOSE AND BERNSTEIN, 2006, PP. 100] Cheney secures permission from King Fahd for US forces to use Saudi territory as a staging ground for an attack on Iraq. Cheney is polite, but forceful; the US will not accept any limits on the number of troops stationed in Saudi Arabia, and will not accept a fixed date of withdrawal (though they will withdraw if Fahd so requests). Cheney uses classified satellite intelligence to convince Fahd of Hussein’s belligerent intentions against not just Kuwait, but against Saudi Arabia as well. Fahd is convinced, saying that if there is a war between the US and Iraq, Saddam Hussein will “not get up again.” Fahd’s acceptance of Cheney’s proposal goes against the advice of Crown Prince Abdullah. [SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, 8/3/2000; DUBOSE AND BERNSTEIN, 2006, PP. 100-101] With Prince Bandar bin Sultan translating, Cheney tells Abdullah, “After the danger is over, our forces will go home.” Abdullah says under his breath, “I would hope so.” Bandar does not translate this. [MIDDLE EAST REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS, 9/2002; HISTORY NEWS NETWORK, 1/13/2003] On the same trip, Cheney also visits Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak, who rejects Cheney’s request for US use of Egyptian military facilities. Mubarak tells Cheney that he opposes any foreign intervention against Iraq. [SCHOOL OF INTERNATIONAL AND PUBLIC AFFAIRS OF COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, 8/3/2000] US forces will remain in Saudi Arabia for thirteen years (see April 30-August 26, 2003). REFERENCE: August 5, 1990 and After: Cheney Secures Permission for US Forces to Attack Iraq from Saudi Arabia http://www.historycommons.org/context.jsp?item=a080590cheneysaudi#a080590cheneysaudi Profile: Bandar bin Sultan a.k.a. "Bandar Bush", Prince Bandar http://www.historycommons.org/entity.jsp?entity=bandar_bin_sultan

USA/Great Britain/King Fahd financed Iraq Iran War but when Saddam Hussein entered Kuwait [Worst than Saudi Arabia] Fahd ordered Saudi Retard Toady Mutawwas to Issue Fatwa against the Same Saddam. Debauch Saudi Wahabi Somersault Fatwa of Takfeer against Saddam Hussein. In 1996 then-UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright was asked by 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl, in reference to years of U.S.-led economic sanctions against Iraq, “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?” To which Ambassador Albright responded, “I think that is a very hard choice, but the price, we think, the price is worth it.” - BAGHDAD, Oct. 10 — A team of American and Iraqi public health researchers has estimated that 600,000 civilians have died in violence across Iraq since the 2003 American invasion, the highest estimate ever for the toll of the war here. The figure breaks down to about 15,000 violent deaths a month, a number that is quadruple the one for July given by Iraqi government hospitals and the morgue in Baghdad and published last month in a United Nations report in Iraq. That month was the highest for Iraqi civilian deaths since the American invasion. But it is an estimate and not a precise count, and researchers acknowledged a margin of error that ranged from 426,369 to 793,663 deaths. It is the second study by researchers from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. It uses samples of casualties from Iraqi households to extrapolate an overall figure of 601,027 Iraqis dead from violence between March 2003 and July 2006. REFERENCE: Iraqi Dead May Total 600,000, Study Says By SABRINA TAVERNISE and DONALD G. McNEIL Jr. Published: October 11, 2006 http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/11/world/middleeast/11casualties.html

On the brink of war, both supporters and critics of United States policy on Iraq agree on the origins, at least, of the haunted relations that have brought us to this pass: America's dealings with Saddam Hussein, justifiable or not, began some two decades ago with its shadowy, expedient support of his regime in the Iraq-Iran war of the 1980's. Both sides are mistaken. Washington's policy traces an even longer, more shrouded and fateful history. Forty years ago, the Central Intelligence Agency, under President John F. Kennedy, conducted its own regime change in Baghdad, carried out in collaboration with Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi leader seen as a grave threat in 1963 was Abdel Karim Kassem, a general who five years earlier had deposed the Western-allied Iraqi monarchy. Washington's role in the coup went unreported at the time and has been little noted since. America's anti-Kassem intrigue has been widely substantiated, however, in disclosures by the Senate Committee on Intelligence and in the work of journalists and historians like David Wise, an authority on the C.I.A. From 1958 to 1960, despite Kassem's harsh repression, the Eisenhower administration abided him as a counter to Washington's Arab nemesis of the era, Gamal Abdel Nasser of Egypt -- much as Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush would aid Saddam Hussein in the 1980's against the common foe of Iran. By 1961, the Kassem regime had grown more assertive. Seeking new arms rivaling Israel's arsenal, threatening Western oil interests, resuming his country's old quarrel with Kuwait, talking openly of challenging the dominance of America in the Middle East -- all steps Saddam Hussein was to repeat in some form -- Kassem was regarded by Washington as a dangerous leader who must be removed. REFERENCE: A Tyrant 40 Years in the Making By Roger Morris Published: March 14, 2003 Roger Morris, author of ''Richard Milhous Nixon: The Rise of an American Politician,'' is completing a book about United States covert policy in Central and South Asia. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/14/opinion/a-tyrant-40-years-in-the-making.html

In 1963 Britain and Israel backed American intervention in Iraq, while other United States allies -- chiefly France and Germany -- resisted. But without significant opposition within the government, Kennedy, like President Bush today, pressed on. In Cairo, Damascus, Tehran and Baghdad, American agents marshaled opponents of the Iraqi regime. Washington set up a base of operations in Kuwait, intercepting Iraqi communications and radioing orders to rebels. The United States armed Kurdish insurgents. The C.I.A.'s ''Health Alteration Committee,'' as it was tactfully called, sent Kassem a monogrammed, poisoned handkerchief, though the potentially lethal gift either failed to work or never reached its victim.Then, on Feb. 8, 1963, the conspirators staged a coup in Baghdad. For a time the government held out, but eventually Kassem gave up, and after a swift trial was shot; his body was later shown on Baghdad television. Washington immediately befriended the successor regime. ''Almost certainly a gain for our side,'' Robert Komer, a National Security Council aide, wrote to Kennedy the day of the takeover. As its instrument the C.I.A. had chosen the authoritarian and anti-Communist Baath Party, in 1963 still a relatively small political faction influential in the Iraqi Army. According to the former Baathist leader Hani Fkaiki, among party members colluding with the C.I.A. in 1962 and 1963 was Saddam Hussein, then a 25-year-old who had fled to Cairo after taking part in a failed assassination of Kassem in 1958. According to Western scholars, as well as Iraqi refugees and a British human rights organization, the 1963 coup was accompanied by a bloodbath. Using lists of suspected Communists and other leftists provided by the C.I.A., the Baathists systematically murdered untold numbers of Iraq's educated elite -- killings in which Saddam Hussein himself is said to have participated. No one knows the exact toll, but accounts agree that the victims included hundreds of doctors, teachers, technicians, lawyers and other professionals as well as military and political figures. The United States also sent arms to the new regime, weapons later used against the same Kurdish insurgents the United States had backed against Kassem and then abandoned. Soon, Western corporations like Mobil, Bechtel and British Petroleum were doing business with Baghdad -- for American firms, their first major involvement in Iraq. REFERENCE: A Tyrant 40 Years in the Making By Roger Morris Published: March 14, 2003 Roger Morris, author of ''Richard Milhous Nixon: The Rise of an American Politician,'' is completing a book about United States covert policy in Central and South Asia. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/14/opinion/a-tyrant-40-years-in-the-making.html

But it wasn't long before there was infighting among Iraq's new rulers. In 1968, after yet another coup, the Baathist general Ahmed Hassan al-Bakr seized control, bringing to the threshold of power his kinsman, Saddam Hussein. Again, this coup, amid more factional violence, came with C.I.A. backing. Serving on the staff of the National Security Council under Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon in the late 1960's, I often heard C.I.A. officers -- including Archibald Roosevelt, grandson of Theodore Roosevelt and a ranking C.I.A. official for the Near East and Africa at the time -- speak openly about their close relations with the Iraqi Baathists. This history is known to many in the Middle East and Europe, though few Americans are acquainted with it, much less understand it. Yet these interventions help explain why United States policy is viewed with some cynicism abroad. George W. Bush is not the first American president to seek regime change in Iraq. Mr. Bush and his advisers are following a familiar pattern. The Kassem episode raises questions about the war at hand. In the last half century, regime change in Iraq has been accompanied by bloody reprisals. How fierce, then, may be the resistance of hundreds of officers, scientists and others identified with Saddam Hussein's long rule? Why should they believe America and its latest Iraqi clients will act more wisely, or less vengefully, now than in the past? If a new war in Iraq seems fraught with danger and uncertainty, just wait for the peace. REFERENCE: A Tyrant 40 Years in the Making By Roger Morris Published: March 14, 2003 Roger Morris, author of ''Richard Milhous Nixon: The Rise of an American Politician,'' is completing a book about United States covert policy in Central and South Asia. http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/14/opinion/a-tyrant-40-years-in-the-making.html

Late. Abd al-Aziz ibn Abd Allah ibn Baaz [Saudi Grand Mufti who issued Fatwa against Saddam and then against Osama Bin Ladin] - When Saddam invaded Kuwait - [Immediately a Fatwa was issued against Saddam - "During the Iran-Iraq war, Saudi Arabia bankrolled the Saddam Hussein regime with the express approval of Washington DC which at that time saw Saddam Hussein as a bulwark against Shia fundamentalism. It came as a terrific shock to the Saudi Royals when Saddam Hussein turned his attention to Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. Again, the Royal family turned to the Ulema and obtained (with difficulty) a Fatwa, permitting the use of non-Muslim foreign troops on Saudi soil to defend Saudi Arabia against a foreign invader - one the Ulema regarded as a secular apostate. Thus the Saudi Royal family invited the USA to send it its troops for Operation Desert Storm- the operation to defend Saudi Arabia and liberate Kuwait - largely at Saudi expense." As per 9/11 Commission Report “In August 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Bin Ladin, whose efforts in Afghanistan had earned him celebrity and respect, proposed to the Saudi monarchy that he summon mujahideen for a jihad to retake Kuwait. He was rebuffed, [Saudi Fatwa issued in 90s against Osama Bin Ladin - http://abdurrahman.org/jihad/binlaadin.pdf Usama Ibn Ladin Al-Kharijee (our position toward him and his likes) - By Abdul Aziz Ibn Abdullaah Ibn Baz [PDF] - Taken from http://www.troid.org/] and the Saudis joined the U.S.-led coalition. After the Saudis agreed to allow U.S. armed forces to be based in the Kingdom, Bin Ladin and a number of Islamic clerics began to publicly denounce the arrangement. The Saudi government exiled the clerics and undertook to silence Bin Ladin by, among other things, taking away his passport. With help from a dissident member of the royal family, he managed to get out of the country under the pretext of attending an Islamic gathering in Pakistan in April 1991.”

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Misconception: The Islaamic Threat

In recent years, a great deal of attention in the media have been given to the threat of "Islaamic Fundamentalism". Unfortunately, due to a twisted mixture of biased reporting in the Western media and the actions of some ignorant Muslims, the word "Islaam" has become almost synonymous with "terrorism". However, when one analyses the situation, the question that should come to mind is:

Do the teachings of Islaam encourage terrorism?

The answer: Certainly not!

Islaam totally forbids the terrorist acts that are carried out by some misguided people. It should be remembered that all religions have cults and misguided followers, so it is their teachings that should be looked at, not the actions of a few individuals. Unfortunately, in the media, whenever a Muslim commits a heinous act, he is labeled a "Muslim terrorist".

However, when Serbs murder and rape innocent women in Bosnia, they are not called "Christian terrorists", nor are the activities in Northern Ireland labeled "Christian terrorism". Also, when right-wing Christians in the U. S. bomb abortion clinics, they are not called "Christian terrorists". Reflecting on these facts, one could certainly conclude that there is a double-standard in the media! Although religious feelings play a significant role in the previously mentioned "Christian" conflicts, the media does not apply religious labels because they assume that such barbarous acts have nothing to do with the teachings of Christianity. However, when something happens involving a Muslim, they often try to put the blame on Islaam itself - and not the misguided individual.

Certainly, Islaamic Law (Sharee'ah) allows war - any religion or civilisation that did not would never survive - but it certainly does not condone attacks against innocent people, women or children. The Arabic word "jihaad", which is often translated as "Holy War", simply means "to struggle". The word for "war" in Arabic is "harb", not "jihaad". "Struggling", i.e. "making jihaad", to defend Islaam, Muslims or to liberate a land where Muslims are oppressed is certainly allowed (and even encouraged) in Islaam.

However, any such activities must be done according to the teachings of Islaam. Islaam also clearly forbids "taking the law into your own hands", which means that individual Muslims cannot go around deciding who they want to kill, punish or torture.

Trial and punishment must be carried out by a lawful authority and a knowledgeable judge. Also, when looking at events in the Muslim World, it should be kept in mind that a long period of colonialism ended fairly recently in most Muslim countries. During this time, the people in these countries were culturally, materially and religiously exploited - mostly by the so-called "Christian" nations of the West. This painful period has not really come to an end in many Muslim countries, where people are still under the control of foreign powers or puppet regimes supported by foreign powers.

Also, through the media, people in the West are made to believe that tyrants like Saddam Hussein in Iraq and Moamar Qaddafi in Libya are "Islaamic" leaders - when just the opposite is true. Neither of these rulers even profess Islaam as an ideology, but only use Islaamic slogans to manipulate their powerless populations. They have about as much to do with Islaam as Hitler had to do with Christianity! In reality, many Middle Eastern regimes which people think of as being "Islaamic" oppress the practice of Islaam in their countries. So suffice it to say that "terrorism" and killing innocent people directly contradicts the teachings of Islaam. .......... Prepared by: Abu 'Iyaad REFERENCE: Misconception: The Islaamic Threat http://www.fatwa-online.com/aboutislaam/0020221.htmhttp://www.fatwa-online.com/index.htmhttp://www.fatwa-online.com/worship/jihaad/jih009/index.htm

Question: O esteemed Shaykh, what is happening now (in Iraaq) so what is the position of the Muslim towards this trial, and is there a Jihaad, and are do those soldiers who are in the Gulf have the ruling of being mujaahideen, and may Allaah reward you.

Shaykh Ubayd al-Jaabiree: I dont know why this question (is asked) when, when we have just ended the speech with what I consider to comprise the answer to it and to its likes. However, despite this, just so that it is said, that Ubayd has neglected some of the questions.

So I say: Firstly, not all of the Iraaqi society is Muslim. Rather, amongst them is the Marxist, amongst them is the Ba'athist Heretic, and amongst them are numerous orientations. And there are Muslims amongst them...

And amongst them are the Raafidah. And the positions of the Scholars towards the Raafidah is well known, amongst them are those who declared them Disbelievers.

Secondly, we have Rulers and those who have authority, and it is obligatory to give them hearing and obedience, and around our rulers are those who have knowledge, and experience, and speciality in the political affairs. So we do not undermine them, and we have already mentioned previously that the general affairs are not for just any person. Rather, they are for whom? For those in authority.

And as it is appropriate, I also say that those who call to cutting off from the products of America and Britain and others, then those people have a resemblance to the Raafidah. Shaykh ul-Islaam Ibn Taymiyyah mentions in Minhaaj us-Sunnah, in the first volume, and I believe it is page 38, "From the stupidity of the Raafidah is that they do not drink from the river that was unearthed (i.e. dug out, like a well) by Yazeed". So those Harakiyyoon and Hizbiyyoon, have resembled the Raafidah. And what an evil model (that is). And the most repugnant for a person that his model, and way is that of the Raafidah.

Thirdly, the banner of fighting in Iraaq, who is carrying it? It is carried by Saddaam Hussain at-Takreetee, and he is the leader of the Ba'athi Party in his land...and the Ba'athi Party, is secularist, disbelieving, heretical. Its foundation is upon mixing and not differentiating between a Sunni Muslim, Guidance from the Scholars Concerning Iraaq and between the Jew, Christian, Communist, and others. They are all the same, equal. And for this reason, their slogan is, as their poet has said:

I believe in, -- (Shaykh Ubayd): I seek refuge in Allaah --
I believe in al-Ba'ath as the Lord which has no partner
And in Arabism as a religion, which has no other (religion)

This is their religion, qawmiyyah (nationalism) and shu'oobiyyah, and their religion is not Islaam. So built upon this, the one who fights under the banner of the Iraaqi government, then he is fighting under a banner of disbelief. And we do not dispute that the people of Iraaq have the right to defend themselves. They can defend themselves, their blood, their honour and their wealth, they can defend those who transgress upon them, whether America or Britain or other than them.

So it is obligatory upon us, the community of Muslims that we ask Allaah in our supplication that He delivers the Muslims amongst the people of Iraaq. So whoever said O Allaah save the [Iraaqi Society]1 , then he has erred. This supplication of his reaches even the Marxist and the Communist. And the Ba'ath Party is at the front of the [supplication of the] one who supplicates for the Iraaqi society (in general). No, but supplicate to Allaah that He delivers the Muslims amongst the people of Iraaq. And that he relieves them of their distress. This is what I can add now. .......... Translated by: Abu 'Iyaad REFERENCE: NEWS\ Monday 31 March 2003 Shaykh 'Ubayd al-Jaabiree on the Position Towards Iraq From a Paltalk Session today 31/03/2003 at 8:30pm UK Time http://www.fatwa-online.com/news/0030331.htm

BAGHDAD — Iraq's two most deadly Shiite Muslim militias have killed thousands of Sunni Arabs since February, with the more experienced Badr Brigade often working in tandem with Al Mahdi army, collecting intelligence on targets and forming hit lists that Al Mahdi militia members carry out, a senior U.S. military official said Wednesday. In some cases, death squads have been accompanied by a "clerical figure to basically run" an Islamic court to provide "the blessing for the conduct of the execution," the official said. The disclosures came during a U.S. intelligence briefing that included details about Shiite militia death squad operations and links to Iranian finance and weapons networks. The military official said there were corrupt Iraqi security officers who allowed Shiite militia members to kill Sunni Arabs in Baghdad neighborhoods that had been secured by joint U.S.-Iraqi military sweeps aimed at quelling sectarian violence. The official spoke on condition of anonymity, but was one of a series of high-ranking American officials who gave detailed briefings to reporters this week, at a time when the U.S. military is struggling to restore order to Baghdad and to press the Iraqi government to move decisively against Shiite militias. The Badr Brigade, the military wing of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq -- a member of the leading Shiite political bloc with 30 seats in parliament -- was responsible for most of the Shiite death squad killings last year, the official said. That changed in February, when Sunni Arab insurgents bombed the Shiite shrine of the Golden Mosque in Samarra, and Al Mahdi army, a militia loyal to radical anti-Western Shiite cleric Muqtada Sadr, moved to the front of a rising sectarian bloodbath. Sadr's political organization also holds 30 parliamentary seats and controls several government ministries. The hallmarks of the Shiite death squads have been mass killings in which the victims are found with their "hands bound, shot in the back or head," and their bodies showing signs of torture, the U.S. official said. Mosques and safehouses in Sadr City, a huge poor Shiite neighborhood that is the Al Mahdi stronghold in Baghdad, have been the base for many death squad operations, the official said. The official also said that Iraq's Interior Ministry, known to be heavily infiltrated by both Shiite militias, was complicit in many of the killings. Militia members have used Iraqi security forces' uniforms and vehicles during assassinations and checkpoint sweeps. "Those would get up to 60 individuals detained in a sweep," the official said. "OK, and again, often they would release those who were Shiite. We'd see that over the course of, say, that afternoon. And then there'd be individuals ransomed, and then there would perhaps be a mass killing in Sadr City and burial." American military officials have arrested at least 30 death squad members, the official said, all of them associated with extreme Al Mahdi militia elements. Death squad cells within the Badr Brigade still carry out killings, the official said, but the number of slayings by Al Mahdi extremist cells has far outstripped them. Al Mahdi militia's growth has hindered Sadr's ability to control the paramilitary force, the official said, citing instances when the cleric's commands to fighters to stand down were ignored by militia commanders. The official said U.S. investigators in Iraq have evidence that militiamen have acquired shoulder-fired rockets capable of shooting down aircraft, as well as Iranian-made explosives capable of puncturing armor plating. Iran has "enhanced violence" in some militia-dominated Iraqi cities with its flow of weapons, the official said, but he downplayed the Shiite-controlled country's long-term influence in Iraq, saying that Iraq's historic independent streak would eventually outweigh its affinities for its neighbor. REFERENCE: THE CONFLICT IN IRAQ Killings by Shiite Militias Detailed September 28, 2006|Solomon Moore | Times Staff Writer http://articles.latimes.com/2006/sep/28/world/fg-intel28

In fact I suggested a number of people and I'm sure you've seen it in my messages to my superiors, a number of people who could meet with senior Iranian officials and various ways in which that could happen. In that January meeting I told him that I was not confident that we were headed in the right direction.. . .Mr. Ghorbanifar by then was aware of my role in support for the Nicaraguan resistance. He had seen my name in the newspapers. He is a very well-read individual. I had been told by the Central Intelligence Agency, by Director Casey himself and by others in the C.I.A., that they believed Mr. Ghorbanifar to be an Israeli intelligence agent. * * * Mr. Ghorbanifar took me into the bathroom and Mr. Ghorbanifar suggested several incentives to make that February transaction work. And the attractive incentive for me was the one he made that residuals could flow to support the Nicaraguan resistance. * * * I must confess to you that I thought using the Ayatollah's money to support the Nicaraguan resistance was a right idea. And I must confess to you that I advocated that. * * * And I saw that idea of using the Ayatollah Khomeini's money to support the Nicaraguan freedom fighters as a good one. I still do. I don't think it was wrong. I think it was a neat idea. And I came back and I advocated that and we did it. We did it on three occasions. Those three occasions were February, May and October. And in each one of those occasions as a consequence of that whole process we got three Americans back. And there was no terrorism, while we were engaged in it, against Americans. For almost 18 months there was no action against Americans until it started to come unraveled. I believed then and I believe now that we had a chance to achieve a strategic opening and right up until the last minute that I left the N.S.C. I was in communication with the Israelis and others who were working on the second channel to achieve that end. The fact is that whether it was Mr. Ghorbanifar himself who originated the idea or Mr. Nir or others within the Israeli Government, it was a good idea. It was a good idea because we weren't using the taxpayers' money, we were using the Ayatollah's money. And it went indeed to support the Nicaraguan resistance. REFERENCE: IRAN-CONTRA HEARINGS; Day 2: The President's Knowledge and the Ayatollah's Money Published: July 09, 1987 http://www.nytimes.com/1987/07/09/world/iran-contra-hearings-day-2-the-president-s-knowledge-and-the-ayatollah-s-money.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm

The Mahdi Army: The Mahdi Army—named after a Shiite messianic figure—is a militia of several thousand members loyal to the young anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The group led two uprisings last year against U.S. forces before agreeing to a ceasefire in October 2004. The militia is heavily influential in Najaf, a city in southern Iraq, and in Sadr City, a Baghdad slum of some 2.5 million Shiites. Some news reports suggest the Mahdi Army may be regrouping and rearming itself. In recent months, Sadr’s group has been accused of abducting Sunni Arabs as well as members of rival Shiite militias like the Badr Organization, British troops, and journalists, including Rory Carroll, an Irish reporter for the British newspaper the Guardian. On October 27, in Medayna, a village northeast of Baghdad, a group of so-called Sadrists reportedly raided and set ablaze several homes suspected of harboring Sunni insurgents; the ensuing fight left some twenty people dead. Some experts say the group is not an organized, disciplined unit with clear political objectives. ''I think the Sadrists are a social movement, not really so much an organization,'' said Juan Cole, a Middle East expert at the Universityof Michigan , in an interview with the New York Times. ''So you have these neighborhood-based youth gangs masquerading as an 'army.' Then you have the mosque preachers loyal to Muqtada who try to swing their congregations, and who interface with the youth gangs.''Other experts say Sadr is receiving aid from Iran’s intelligence services and Revolutionary Guard, though this is widely disputed. “Sadr is a very poor prospect as an Iranian proxy,” argues Michael Knights, a London-based associate with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “He’s xenophobic. He’s very disenchanted with Iranian-sponsored exiles who are currently heading up Iraq’s Shiite block, including of course Prime Minister [Ibrahim al-] Jaafari and SCIRI. He has recently flexed militarily with SCIRI’s Badr forces, so he’s generally not an ideal proxy for the Iranians to use.” Regardless, Sadr has emerged as a powerful figure in Iraqi politics and relishes his new kingmaker position. Though he has refused to participate directly in Iraqi politics, his supporters won a handful of parliamentary seats in the January 30 elections and thirty of his candidates joined the mainstream Shiite coalition, the United Iraqi Alliance, ahead of the December 15 parliamentary elections. REFERENCE: Shiite Militias and Iraq's Security Forces Author: Lionel Beehner November 30, 2005 http://www.cfr.org/iraq/shiite-militias-iraqs-security-forces/p9316

The Badr Organization: The Badr Organization, formerly known as the Badr Brigade, was built by Iraqi Shiite defectors and soldiers captured by Iran during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War. Its members were funded, trained, and equipped by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. In 2003, the 10,000-strong militia changed its name from the Badr Brigade to the Badr Organization of Reconstruction and Development after pledging to disarm and devote itself to peaceful purposes and is now the armed wing of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), a Shiite opposition party founded in 1982 by Iraqi exiles in Iran. SCIRI, which has emerged as Iraq’s most powerful political party, advocates the creation of a separate, Shiite-run region comprising nine oil-rich provinces in southern Iraq. In a rare November 27 interview with the Washington Post, SCIRI’s leader, Abdul Aziz Hakim, downplayed his organization’s ties to Iran and denied accusations that the Badr Organization practiced torture or targeted Sunni Arabs. The group, however, has remained armed, experts say, and has been accused of assassinating, torturing, and unlawfully detaining Sunni Arabs. Peter Khalil, former director of national security policy with the CPA and a Middle East analyst with the Eurasia Group, says the Badr Organization continues to receive support, both military and financial, from Iran (Al-Malaf.net, a Jordanian news site, alleges the Badr Organization still receives a monthly stipend from Tehran of roughly $3 million). The militia group has also said it will run candidates, separate from SCIRI, in the upcoming December 15 parliamentary elections as part of the United Iraqi Alliance, the most powerful Shiite coalition. The Badr Organization has recently clashed with British troops in Basra and with the al-Sadr’s Mahdi Army, also based in Iraq’s predominantly Shiite south. In August, after Sadr’s headquarters in Najaf were set aflame, the Mahdi Army staged a reprisal attack against Badr troops. “It’s a mafia-style war between two descendants of Iraq’s leading ayatollah-led families, the Sadrs and the Hakims, who don’t exactly express affection for each other,” writes Robert Dreyfuss, a national security expert, in TomPaine.Com. Further attacks were called off by Sadr after Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani intervened to quell the dispute. The Badr Organization denied responsibility for setting fire to Sadr’s offices. REFERENCE: Shiite Militias and Iraq's Security Forces Author: Lionel Beehner November 30, 2005 http://www.cfr.org/iraq/shiite-militias-iraqs-security-forces/p9316

Shia Death Squads Part - 5/5

The Wolf Brigade: One of the Badr Organization’s offshoots is the Wolf Brigade, a unit of roughly 2,000 special commando police officially under the Ministry of the Interior that is among Iraq’s most feared groups. Last November, the brigade—which was formed in the fall of 2004 by a former three-star Shiite general and SCIRI official whose nom de guerre is Abu Walid—fought alongside U.S.-led forces in Mosul, a Sunni stronghold northwest of Baghdad. Its members dress in garb—olive uniform, red beret, wraparound sunglasses—redolent of Saddam’s elite guard; their armband logo is a menacing-looking wolf. Last December, the Wolf Brigade won further notoriety after the success of Terrorism in the Grip of Justice, a primetime show on U.S.-funded al-Iraqiya television that featured live interrogations of Iraqi insurgents by Wolf Brigade commandos. In one show, Abu Walid questioned around thirty shabbily dressed suspects, some clutching photos of their victims, waiting to confess their crimes. The Wolf Brigade was reportedly responsible for the July seizure of eleven Sunni bricklayers who were then locked in the back of police cars and held for sixteen hours in scorching-hot temperatures. The brigade’s fierceness has given it a mythological aura among Shiite Iraqis: Parents are said to warn their children about the “wolves.” There are also patriotic songs devoted to the group. However, in May, the Sunni-controlled Muslim Scholars Association and other Sunni Arab leaders accused the Wolf Brigade of targeting Palestinian refugees in Iraq, using torture to extract confessions from prisoners, raiding Sunni homes, and engaging in “mass killings” and arrests in northeastern Baghdad. Walid denies the charges. Yet human rights groups say the Wolf Brigade, because of its counterterrorism television show, is violating the Geneva Conventions by publicly humiliating detainees. Despite its heavy-handed tactics, the group has proved useful to counterinsurgency operations. In mid-November 2004, the Wolf Brigade successfully arrested more than 300 suspected insurgents, including several Sunni officials, in Baqubah, a city northeast of Baghdad. The militia has also spawned copycat groups, not necessarily under the aegis of the Interior Ministry, with names like the Tiger, Scorpion, or Snake brigades. REFERENCE: Shiite Militias and Iraq's Security Forces Author: Lionel Beehner November 30, 2005 http://www.cfr.org/iraq/shiite-militias-iraqs-security-forces/p9316